


Plausible Deniability

by ultharkitty



Category: Transformers Generation One
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-29
Updated: 2011-12-29
Packaged: 2017-10-28 11:08:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/307241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ultharkitty/pseuds/ultharkitty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The hot copter and the cute tank are in serious trouble, but Vortex has a plan. All he has to do is get Brawl to listen to it. Simple, no?</p><p>Contains: mention of interfacing, mention of violence, coarse language, reminiscence about their early years, crack</p>
            </blockquote>





	Plausible Deniability

“There’s this thing,” Vortex said. “It’s called plausible deniability.”

Brawl gave an enthusiastic nod. Perched on the edge of Onslaught’s desk, he was fidgety, his optics fever-bright and completely unfocused. The lights were on, but it was arguable as to whether anyone was home.

“Say it after me,” Vortex prompted. “Plausible. Deniability.”

“Plussable. Deniability,” Brawl said, glancing up at the ceiling. He swayed a little as he followed the rotation of the cooling fan.

“Eh, close enough.” Vortex sighed, his rotors clattering against Onslaught’s impeccably organised shelves. “You know what that means, right?”

Brawl continued to sway.

“Oh for frag sake.” Vortex shoved his knees apart and grabbed his helm, tugging his head back down to realign the angle of his gaze. “Look at me when I’m talking to you.”

“Oooh, hey, we gonna frag now? Cause I could do with easin’ a bit of pressure.” Brawl patted his codpiece. “If you know what I mean.”

Vortex vented slowly; the urge to head butt him in the visor was difficult to resist. Much as interfacing was never that far from Vortex’s mind, he wasn’t sure how Brawl could think of it at this precise moment. “No,” he said, eventually. “And do you know why?”

Brawl shook his head. “Hey, didn’t sarge used to say that plussable deniawhatsiface slag?”

Well, what do you know, a synapse firing. “Yeah, he did,” Vortex said. “Can you remember what else he used to say?”

Brawl tried to raise his helm, but Vortex held it. “Uh… ‘Get out there and gimme fifty?’” he hazarded. “Ooooh, and ‘What in the name of Vector Sigma do you think you’re doing?’ He used to say that a lot. And that one about storing your ammo right. And cleaning your guns. And about how all rotaries were as dumb as Nebulan land toads and twice as horny.”

Vortex glared. “What about the _other_ thing he used to say. Back in basic augmentation.”

“The whu?” Brawl responded. “Fragged if I can remember. I dunno scrap what happened when I came off that conveyor and you know it.”

“He used to say,” Vortex pressed on, ignoring the whine building in Brawl’s engine. “‘Don’t frag up. If you’re gonna frag up, don’t get caught, and if you're gonna get caught, pin it on some other bastard, and _never_ give them enough to pin it on you.’” He leaned forward, pressing their visors together, blocking visual input from anything but himself in the hope that Brawl might focus. “Remember that?”

Brawl’s optics flickered, widening under the orange glass. “Oh! Yeah!” He tried to tilt his head. “I don’t get it. Why you tellin’ me this? We already got caught.”

“Well yeah,” Vortex said patiently. “But here's the thing: they think it was us, but they don’t _know_. That’s why Onslaught’s left us in here to have this little talk. And we’ve got half a breem before he gets back, so, are you listening?”

“Sure, yeah, I’m _listening!_ ” Brawl huffed.

Funny, Vortex thought, because it doesn’t look like it. “OK, so, _you_ know we slagged over Ramjet, gave that box thing he was carrying to Swindle, and made off with the high grade. _I_ know we slagged over Ramjet, gave that box thing to Swindle, and made off with the high grade. But Megatron doesn’t, not really.”

“Awwwwwwwwww!” Brawl wailed. “You’re about to do that thing where you say stuff and it makes my insides all itch ‘cause of the bad code!”

“Not if you listen carefully,” Vortex said. The loyalty programming could be circumvented, it just took some creative thinking. And some simple concepts when explaining it to Brawl. “Ramjet’s lost his short-term storage, he won’t be able to identify us. We don’t have the box thingy any more, the super-weapon that was in it, or the high grade. The only evidence is up here.” He tapped his helm, then remembered Brawl’s idiosyncratic internal geography and tapped the tank on his chest. “Or in here, whatever. Important thing is, there’s no evidence except in our databanks.

“Now…” he paused, waiting for Brawl to look as though he was catching up. “Megsy needs us. We’re like his best troops, and he needs Bruticus. If he finds out what we did, _especially_ if he finds out Swin’s gone and sold his new super-weapon to the squishies in Russia, we’re gonna get locked up. And if we get locked up, all his plans all go to scrap, right?”

Brawl looked as though he was about to be the voice of reason, his head trying to shake a ‘no’ in Vortex’s hands. Vortex held him still.

“ _Right?_ ” Vortex pressed.

“Uh, yeah, right!” Brawl said.

“And if Megsy’s plans all go to scrap, that’d be us making a deliberate move against him, wouldn’t it?”

Brawl seemed to think about this, before uttering a far quieter and less certain, “ _Riiiiiight?_ ”

“So,” Vortex said. “To stay loyal, we gotta stop Megsy from finding out what we did. ‘Cause we don’t wanna frag up his plans, do we, Brawlie?”

“No!” Brawl responded, this time with the certainty of a mech who knows that he’s finally saying what his team mate wants him to say.

Vortex nodded, pulling back a little. “OK, now this is where the plausible deniability stuff comes in. You ready?”

Brawl nodded slowly.

“If we’re gonna convince Megsy that it wasn’t us, we gotta do a quick number on our databanks.”

“Nooooooo!”

“ _Yes_ ,” Vortex said, resisting the urge to copy Brawl’s diction. “Only things you gotta get rid of is where we handed over that box thing to Swindle, and this conversation. You don’t need to get rid of the rest, just swap it around with something else.”

“But then then then my memories, they’ll be all out of order!” Brawl cried.

And what? Vortex thought. You’ll get confused? Too late for that. “Yeah, I know. We can fix it later. We just gotta get rid of the direct evidence. Replace it with a clip of us fragging from the other night. Y’know, with that thick old oil and the paintbrush. Who the Pit’s gonna wanna watch that?”

“O _kay_ ,” Brawl said. “But I don’t like this.”

“It’s all good,” Vortex replied. “I hid the high grade in Wildrider’s small arms locker, and he doesn’t have an alibi. If they find out we did one over on Ramjet, they still don’t know we gave the box to Swin, and we won't have a clue what the frag happened to it. But as long as it’s not Soundwave doing the scan, they won’t get that far. We’ll be off the hook and Megsy’s plans will be safe. You got all that?”

“I dunno,” Brawl said. “I feel kinda itchy.”

Vortex could sympathise, but he wasn’t about to admit it. “OK, you swapped the memory file around?”

“I’m gettin’ to it!” Brawl shuffled his legs, making the table wobble. “OK, I done it now.”

“All right,” said Vortex. “Permanent deletion of the bit where Swin nabbed the box, and the whole of the last two beems in three… two… one…”

* * *

When Onslaught slipped back into his office, Vortex was poking Brawl’s caterpillar treads, testing them to see how springy they were.

“You done?” Onslaught said.

Vortex shrugged. “Uh, we didn’t frag on your desk, honest.” He wasn’t sure what they _had_ done, but his interface hardware felt sadly neglected, so it couldn’t have been that. Brawl just followed Vortex’s fingers, flexing his heel component happily.

“Brawl?” Onslaught said.

“Huh?” Brawl glanced up, but when no further instruction was forthcoming, his attention went back to the moving parts.

Onslaught nodded. “Good,” he said. “Megatron will see you now.”


End file.
